S. FLORIDA VISIONARY LEFT MARK ON OUR LIFE

Visionary businessman Ted Arison, founder of Carnival Cruise Lines, major patron of the arts and the man who brought The Miami Heat to South Florida, died in Israel on Friday of heart failure. He was 75.

Few recent figures have had such a broad impact on South Florida as Arison, who used his wealth to build institutions that benefit arts and sports fans and who anchored an entire industry here.

Arison's business touch was almost unparalleled. Starting with a single ship in 1972, he built Carnival into a $2.5 billion a year company that operates six cruise lines and dozens of ships.

His enterprise made Arison a rich man. By 1992, Forbes listed him as one of the world's 100 richest people with an estimated wealth of $2.8 billion. In recent years, he has divided his wealth among family members. The controlling interest in Carnival, for example, is now held by his son, Carnival Corp. Chairman Micky Arison, who also owns the basketball team.

Ted Arison has given away millions of dollars. He co-founded the New World Symphony for young professional musicians and the National Foundation for Advancement in the Arts, a scholarship program.

"In all my years as a musician I have never met anyone who loved music and those who make music more," said Michael Tilson Thomas, artistic director of the San Francisco Symphony, who helped Arison create the New World Symphony in 1986. "His commitment to excellence and his ability to recognize it wherever he saw it put him in a class by himself."

Arison was passionate about the cruise business, too. "He had a special glow about him when a new ship came in," recalled Rod McLeod, an industry veteran who watched Arison create Carnival.

While working at a rival line, McLeod was invited by Arison one spring day in 1972 to go down to the dock and visit the Mardi Gras, Carnival's first ship, which had just come into the Port of Miami.

"There he was amid the pallets and the provisions, standing there in a pair of chinos and a short-sleeved shirt with a clip board in his hand. He was checking to be sure that Carnival had gotten what they ordered.

"Obviously, his accomplishments and his contributions to the community are well recognized," McLeod said. "What is forgotten is how hard he worked for it."

The Israeli-born son of a ship owner, Arison served in the British Army during World War II and the Israeli Army in the 1948 war of independence. He ran the family ship business and then his own fleet of ships until the Korean War depressed the market and convinced him to leave the business.

By 1966 he was in Miami, where he co-founded Norwegian Caribbean Lines. After a falling out with partner Knut Kloster, Sr., Arison quit that company in 1972 and brought the Mardi Gras to Miami.

The ship ran aground on its first voyage, recalls Royal Caribbean Cruises Vice Chairman Ed Stephan. But there was no doubt in anyone's mind that Arison would be a formidable competitor.

"He had the drive," Stephan said. "We just knew he and his team had it."

Arison's cardinal insight was that cruising could be sold to a mass market, not just an elite market. Far from the Astors and Rockefellers, Carnival's pitch would be to the middle class.

Carnival began with older ships, but they were affordably priced. "He knew if he could fill those ships and get them going he could build it from there," Stephan said.

By 1986, Carnival had progressed to the point where it could sell stock to the public. He retired as chairman in 1990, turning the reinsover to Micky, while continuing to oversee the company's European shipbuilding contracts.

Later that year he reclaimed his Israeli citizenship, returning to live in Tel Aviv. In 1991, Arison stepped up his philanthropic activities, donating $14 million of Carnival stock to endow the New World Symphony. The endowment has since grown to about $75 million, one of the largest of any orchestra in the country.

That lets the symphony think long-term, said president Christopher Dunworth. "That's a real luxury in the performing arts world, where you usually have to worry about where your next check is coming from. He was a great guy, a visionary, one of the true gentlemen I've ever met in my life."

Of all of Arison's activities, the one that may have brought him the greatest community recognition, however, was his underwriting of South Florida's bid to win a National Basketball Association franchise, The Miami Heat.

Arison had no interest in basketball and said he did it to help Miami. And he had no interest in the publicity that came with it.

Pat Reilly, Heat coach, recalled the first time he met Arison was when he signed with the Heat. He went out on Arison's boat on their way to way to press conference on the cruise ship Destiny, passing other Carnival ships along the way. "With all these big ships, I asked him what he thought the key was to winning. And he said, 'No, I want to ask you what the key is to winning.' And I said, 'You've got to have knowledge. I was giving him all these wonderful intellectual thoughts about what it took to win and I asked him, 'What do you think?' And he just simply said, 'You just got to work harder than anybody else.'"

After Arison retired to Israel, he established Arison Investments, buying and setting up companies in high-tech industry, communications, construction and real estate. In 1997 he bought a controlling share in Israel's biggest bank, Bank Hapoalim, for $1.1 billion.

Arison had battled cancer in recent years, but had overcome the disease, a Carnival Corp spokesman said. He had also had early heart trouble and adhered to the Pritikin diet. He died in his home in Tel Aviv.

In addition to his wife, Lin, Arison is survived by his son, Micky and his daughter, Shari. Funeral arrangements had not been officially announced, but Israeli media said they would be Sunday.

PUBLISHED TUESDAY, OCTOBER 5, 1999In an Oct. 2 story on Page 1A about the death of entrepreneur and philanthropist Ted Arison, the name of the Miami Heat coach Pat Riley was misspelled.In addition, the name of son Michael Arison was omitted from a listing of Ted Arison's close relatives.We regret the errors.

PUBLISHED TUESDAY, OCTOBER 5, 1999In an Oct. 2 story on Page 1A about the death of entrepreneur and philanthropist Ted Arison, the name of the Miami Heat coach Pat Riley was misspelled.In addition, the name of son Michael Arison was omitted from a listing of Ted Arison's close relatives.We regret the errors.